This is a cross post from ModernityBlog
The climate for Jews living in the West, and in particular Europe, has changed.
This is evidenced by racist chants at past demonstrations in London, proposed boycotts, the increase in reported antisemitic attacks, the tone of newspaper articles and not least, how it has become acceptable to articulate anti-Jewish sentiment.
Now, of course, we have all heard it and before those views are openly expressed we will hear, “Some of my best friends are Jewish…”, “Criticism is not antisemitic…”, etc etc
Still I wonder how Facebook’s usage in this instance will be explained away, presumably as some juvenile prank, but I have to wonder what type of environment allowed these views to be expressed in the first place?
Facebook has a proposed event “kill a jew day” and its attendees are NOT, as far as I can see, skinheads or known neo-fascists, in fact, a few seem to be British university graduates.
